


kills you slowly

by cherrymatsu



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Established Relationship, Incest, Introspection, Light Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-05
Updated: 2019-11-05
Packaged: 2021-01-23 08:42:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21317338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherrymatsu/pseuds/cherrymatsu
Summary: Genji exhales the kind of mysticism that their father talks about in his legends—wild, furious, and completely untamed. A shock of green hair, eyes too bright, lips always on the edge of smirking.Even stained with blood.Even when he has nothing to smirk about.
Relationships: Genji Shimada/Hanzo Shimada
Comments: 6
Kudos: 33





	kills you slowly

Genji exhales the kind of mysticism that their father talks about in his legends—wild, furious, and completely untamed. A shock of green hair, eyes too bright, lips always on the edge of smirking.

Even stained with blood.  
Even when he has nothing to smirk about.

Genji’s rebellion runs in his marrow. It is not something they can exorcise. Hanzo knows this. Their father also knows this. Perhaps that is why when Genji dyes his hair, their father’s only response is to laugh. (Had Hanzo done the same, he wouldn’t have any hair.)

Perhaps it is also for this reason that Genji’s anger does not faze him.

When the younger bursts into his room, Hanzo’s gaze never flickers from the report in his hands.

“What is the meaning of this?” Genji speaks in English, staccato accent rippling through his syllables. He knows it annoys them, the clan, when he does.

Hanzo responds in Japanese. “You’ll have to be more specific than that, little brother.”

Genji’s retaliation is a heavy newspaper thrown across his screen.

> **SUSPECTED YAKUZA KILLED IN MYSTERIOUS EXPLOSION**

Hanzo’s expression is placid, but something ugly stirs beneath when he sees the headline. Amusement, bemusement, contempt or resentment—he is not sure.

When his eyes lift to look at him, displeasure bristling through Genji's younger, leaner form like water, Hanzo is unexpectedly relieved. To see Genji care about clan matters at all is a feat.

“And?”

“Watanabe has been with us for decades—“

“And then he betrayed our father.”

Genji stiffens. He leans back from his belligerent stance as confusion flickers across his chiseled features. Hanzo distantly muses that it has been well over four months since they last spoke in person. A holo cannot do the real thing justice.

In four months, Genji’s hair is a vibrant green again, dark roots gone. He has a fresh scar above his left cheek and a new wardrobe. Hanzo does not recognize the bright neon jacket sitting on his shoulders, but it is as ostensible and offensive to the senses as the old.

“What happened?”

Hanzo snorts. He rises from his chair to walk toward the veranda. That Genji has to ask makes Hanzo want to bite out a disparaging remark about his absence, but he refrains.

“Talon approached our father.”

“I know.”

“And Watanabe continued working with them afterward.”

That is enough. That should be enough. Hanzo expects obeisance, _has come to expect it_ as named successor, but Genji’s retort is flippant and laughable.

“So we kill his entire family? His wife? His children?”

“You disagree?”

“They’re _children_, Hanzo.” He says the word like Hanzo should recognize something in it, like children are exempt from their lineage. He supposes that has indeed been Genji’s experience thus far. “There is nothing honorable about this!”

“You _dare_ to lecture me about honor?” Hanzo hisses through clenched teeth, all calmness evaporating in an instant. He pivots on Genji who has rounded the desk while his back was turned.

“You, who gallivants in clubs with women and wastes his time and talent on nothing? Ha!”

If his words hurt, Genji does not show it. His jaw locks, but his face remains defiant, eyebrows furrowed, hands clenched into fists. Genji stands before Hanzo as stranger, enemy, and kin all at once.

Hanzo wants nothing more than to break him. “Do not make me laugh, Genji. Right and wrong are subjective. We do right by the clan. That is enough.”

Hanzo knows it is coming. His senses bristle, muscles automatically flexing to retaliate. He has ample opportunity to dodge, but he doesn’t. Genji’s temper flares, and his left hand comes up to twist in the collar of Hanzo’s dress shirt. The cotton crinkles.

“I’ve never shied away from bloodshed, anija.” The slip back into Japanese is smooth and effortless, but his words come no softer than before. “You know this is wrong.”

Hanzo throws Genji off with both hands. Before Genji can right himself, Hanzo has slammed them both into the edge of his desk. His hands find purchase in Genji’s flashy jacket, some petty part of him hoping it’ll tear as his grip tightens.

“And you think letting them live is mercy? Consumed by hatred and vengeance? Alone? If I lost—“

_You_. The emotion nearly breaks into his tone, but he catches himself. One moment, the hint of frustration and estrangement that has built up between them since their mother’s death. The next, emptiness. Like the vacuum in his chest after a cleanly executed mission and the tremor in his fingers refuse to still long after the blood has washed away.

Hanzo shoves Genji back and turns again. He takes a deep breath, one that fills every crevice of his body with cherry blossom air. Petals drift lazily past an open window into the courtyard below. It is spring now. It was winter when they had a conversation—an argument—much like this one.

“Ani—“

“Enough, Genji. They were a liability. Father made the decision, and I agreed. You have no voice in these matters when you refuse everything else.”

His stomach curls in on itself, and the sudden nausea is overwhelming. He is not sure with whom he is more disgusted, Genji or himself. Because the hate in his words is as strong as the love. Because the coiling desire that he is supposed to feel for men or women or his fiancée is directed at Genji instead even now.

When you refuse everything else—_and me_. Though Hanzo had been the one to break Genji’s trust first. Their fight over his engagement had been louder and longer. Now, Genji falls silent. He is so silent that Hanzo could have mistaken him for gone.

Then, finally:

“You’re right.”

And just like that, the tenuous hold Hanzo has over his brother disappears as if it never existed. All signs of fury and turmoil dissipate with the return of Genji’s infuriating, imperfect English.

Hanzo glances over his shoulder despite himself. Genji is smiling, but it is a hollow smile. His brown eyes mimic a betrayal Hanzo will not show on his face.

“The clan has nothing to do with me.”

**Author's Note:**

> i have a 2k unfinished genji/hanzo smut fic i should rly finish lmao have some light angst tho


End file.
